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Post by rmz19 on May 29, 2016 11:06:35 GMT
LOTS weekly update reporting that this changeover is now postponed to 25 June 2016 so another 3 weeks delay. I wouldn't be surprised if this carries over to the winter At one point I thought this changeover had already been implemented as I saw a few 98 VPs showing 'Holborn' on their blinds while others were terminating at Russell Square about two months ago. I assumed this was a temporary diversion perhaps due to congestion or road works in the area.
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Post by rmz19 on May 28, 2016 1:13:00 GMT
But that's the thing, despite 'snoggle's excellent patronage breakdown, does it really mean that cutbacks need to made in that area given that London is constantly developing and any spare capacity is generally gobbled up. Besides, your above proposal does pander to City of Westminster's thinking regarding the 13 which personally I feel are wholly out of touch. It's also not surprising that all the stakeholder groups around West Hampstead want the 13 axed in favour of an extended 139 despite the fact they are already linked to Golders Green courtesy of the 328 - I suspect most of these respondents don't use buses and instead just want the 139 terminating away from their upmarket area at West End Green - only a sneaky suspicion of course Personally, what I'd do is leave it all as it is but drop the frequency of the 13, 139 & 189 instead. That way, there will still be spare capacity on the 139 & 189 but still some spare capacity if population growths happen along the two routes whilst the 13 won't be branded with the 'it runs around empty' brush. The problem is that the expected and likely growth is north of Finchley Road station and more likely north of Golders Green / A406 (on the 113). This means the 13 is unlikely to ever recover / expand its ridership. This is what happens when the rich and well connected in Swiss Cottage / St Johns Wood can prevent any large scale development happening in their immediate area. Ditto the 139. You're more likely to see what social housing there is, tucked down in South Hampstad and towards Kilburn, being flattened and turned into something up market and that'll affect the 189 at some point. The market for the 13 is probably flat given that zone 1 bus routes are doing badly generally and TfL are not expanding them. This is why the 13 has been given the death warrant by TfL. In the context of the new Mayor's policy they also cannot be seen to be doing anything that will add buses to Oxford Street. If they did Westminster City Council and their best friends at the New West End Company would be on the phone to the Mayor within minutes asking what the hell is going on given the Mayor's policy. No one in Surface Transport is going to put their head on Sadiq's chopping block [1] voluntarily. The problem we have is several immovable policy issues all coming together to seriously affect Zone 1's bus network. I've said this umpteen times and no one seems to believe me. This is just the start of massive, wholesale change. We've got another 4 years of this sort of thing. [1] aka department and senior management rationalisation Zone 1 routes may be having a difficult time and in the 13's case this is exacerbated by the arguably excessive capacity along the Finchley Road corridor. However, even if the 13 is unlikely to expand its ridership and whether it has reached its maximum capacity or not, surely the logical solution would be a frequency reduction rather than going through the hassle of fiddling around with everything else? My frequent observations of the route suggest that it's no different to any other zone 1 route off peak, during the peaks the route is a life saver for those wanting to go towards the areas along the northern end of the route from The West End, which is evident from healthy loadings. This principle should apply to the 13 too as it does with routes in general, if a route is providing more capacity than needed then a frequency reduction would simply negate this rather than resorting to axing the route completely.
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Post by rmz19 on May 27, 2016 19:34:47 GMT
Not really against Boris, just against those pathetic contraptions he conceived. Then again, surely on the basis of them being unbearable on hot days this is a valid reason to be 'against' Boris so to speak?
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Post by rmz19 on May 27, 2016 10:19:03 GMT
Lool that last one though! I entirely sympathise with him as I wanted to that for a very long time...
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Post by rmz19 on May 26, 2016 11:01:42 GMT
9822 of WL appeared to be leaning to one side and bobbing up and down when moving last night, looked like it was about to go out in service on the N381. It appears 9756/57/59 and 9812-9817 have transferred to QB, which is a good thing. 9815 in particular was in a really bad mechanical condition at Walworth (I think it's the one where its throttle pedal stopped working entirely whilst being driven) so hopefully it will receive some attention from the engineers! The "bobbing up and down" reminds me of some of the drivers that would press all three of the kneeling function buttons causing the front of the Tridents to bob up and down as the air tank is emptied. Drivers would often do this whenever the steering adjust is stuck where i am told the procedure was to empty the tanks, isolate the bus, then rev the engine to build up the air pressure again. I don't recall having the problem with London General's examples which had the same trident chassis on their PDLs... bearing in mind their euro3s were slightly newer and probably never had the issue. This so-called 'bouncing' is also evident on some buses when they move too, albeit rarely. Funny enough my latest observation of this occured on a Gemini 3, I couldn't help but think the poor bus is still new, I was cringing and grabbing onto my seat in the anticipation of every incoming pothole This seems to put a lot of stress on the suspension/dampers in the event of a bus going over a hump or pothole which makes an awfully loud noise due to little ground clearance, I am led to believe that this is due to the absence of air within the tanks? I always thought it was down to a mechanical fault.
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Post by rmz19 on May 23, 2016 22:54:18 GMT
I always rather liked the idea of extending the 453 up Lisson Grove and over the 139 to West Hampstead. I also wonder whether the cluster of stations at West Hampstead are a more attractive destination for onward travel than Finchley Road now. Sending the 453 up to West Hampstead would be nice, the 453 would form a great cross-city route linking the north west to the south east. However, as nice as it sounds, it would not be feasible. Reliability would be a major concern due to the added route length and running time.
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Post by rmz19 on May 23, 2016 10:12:14 GMT
This suggestion has probably been mentioned before but...what if, rather than scrapping a route completely they just decrease the PVR by a large amount? E.g. Cut the 13 PVR by 50% or something TBH the 13 seems perfectly fine, it doesn't even need a frequency decrease. As the old saying goes, there's no point of fixing something that isn't broke so this whole gimmick is completely unnecessary.
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Post by rmz19 on May 20, 2016 23:33:26 GMT
Been told the 131 will be part new VH sometime in June as part of a running in and driver familiarisation prior to taking over 85. They won't appear on 57 as that isn't on blinds. In addition to the 85 fleet first few of remaining 20 maybe going to Tolworth whilst not needed for 72. Would seem that this is based on driver familiarisation. I'm trying to work this out, but my guess is the delivery schedule was some of the 20 before factory summer shutdown, to allow driver training and majority second half of August. Probably these pre-shutdown ones, as the training can now be delayed pending clarity on where the VHs are now going. This is quite sad to hear, as the VLEs/VEs will be departing I think I might be the only one on the forum who actually likes them. I know it's not the most favourable type. You're definitely not the only one, I like them alot too. They are one of my favourite DDs so I echo your sentiments
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Post by rmz19 on May 16, 2016 11:03:26 GMT
There are a few routes I regularly used but not exactly for decades as I haven't lived for that long In my teen ages I would regularly use the 6, 13, 18, 27, 28, 31, 36, 52, 82, 113, 187, 274, 316 and 328. Since my transition from College to Uni (and moving houses permanently) until now I've been using the 6 and 36 regularly for ~8 years.
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Post by rmz19 on May 15, 2016 11:14:48 GMT
Is it just me, or are those old style blinds? Looks new style to me, the Woodford Wells blind is a little smaller height wise which seems to be part of the new blind policy with some other blinds I've noticed It looks like the new style indeed due to the uniformity of the destination font, it looks neat IMO. However, what I dislike about the new blinds is the route number style, it appears relatively condensed alongside the destination and it should be more uniform in size to portray a neater look.
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Post by rmz19 on May 13, 2016 12:53:51 GMT
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Post by rmz19 on May 10, 2016 23:49:59 GMT
Don't really see the point. As it cuts costs, better to leave it terminating at the bus garage. I think another route will be better suited to do this. Maybe extend route 212, 215 or 275 from Walthamstow. Can imagine for some reason this was a wind up on the other hand. It's not a wind up, the performance on the 55 is killed by Oxford Circus, terminating at TCR like the 8's do could help the performance, When I drove the 55 we were always getting asked if we went up Leyton High road, and it could take a small amount of load off the 69 and 97's The 275 is the longest millage route at Leyton, the only place I think it will ever get extended to is Gants hill as there is actually a stand that it could use, The 215 getting extended would be pointless, it would kill the performance having a low frequency route tackle Hoe Street traffic, the 212 I also can't see that being changed The only thing that was a joke was taking the LT's off the route The problem with curtailing the 55 to TCR is the load of passengers using the 55 to and from OC. In the peaks it gets ridiculously busy at this end of the route and the 55 consistently picks up a large load of passengers from the first stop. Consequently, the 25 would suffer as it would have to pick up the slack towards Holborn. I also believe the 8 should be reinstated to OC, way overdue.
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Post by rmz19 on May 9, 2016 20:16:37 GMT
He has already promised that he will so hopefully, he sticks to his word. Such a shame. So that means what is he going to replace them with? Well the remaining NB4Ls on order will no doubt be commissioned as I don't see the Mayor cancelling this due to the financial consequences (much as I hope for the contrary). Regarding your question, there is the E400H City, MMC, EvoSeti, MetroDecker and the Gemini 3 just to name a few....so there are more than enough bus types to replace the remaining order with.
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Post by rmz19 on May 9, 2016 12:09:51 GMT
I've only just realised that the ST and SRM are completely different bus types. The former literally being a shorter variant of the LT (according to photos of ST812) and the latter utilising the B5LH chassis. The SRM would definitely be my preference of the two. *broken record alert* If a 'shorter LT' is going to see the light of day then a refresh in any respect would be nice, the SRM at least has a slightly redesigned exterior which would break the LT monotony if they were to complete the remaining NB4L orders
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Post by rmz19 on May 9, 2016 0:03:47 GMT
I don't know why we moan we've had free information provided by GP's for years *creates a reminder on phone calendar to pick one of these up from the GP*
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